History of Cincinnati, Ohio, with illustrations and biographical sketches, Part 121

Author: Ford, Henry A., comp; Ford, Kate B., joint comp
Publication date: 1881
Publisher: Cleveland, O., L.A. Williams & co.
Number of Pages: 666

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dence in the Queen City. He has never remarried. The children are all living-Kessler, Alvin and Leonora -aged sixteen, fourteen and ten respectively.

Mr. Smith has been a member of the Republican party ever since his majority, and he has been active and influential in it from the time he began to take part in politics, which was very soon after he came of age. He was elected a member of the Republican county committee of Hamilton county in the first year there- after, and has been associated with it most of the time since. He was chosen to the first board of aldermen organized in the city government under the two cham- bered system, and was the youngest member of that board. He served as chairman of the committee on streets, the second committee of importance on the board, the chairmanship of the first, or committee on finance, being then filled by Mr. John Shillito. In this capacity, under the law then existing, he was a member of the board of city improvements, the remaining mem- bers being Mayor John F. Torrence, ex officio chairman ; August Wessel, and another, elected members; R. C. Phillips, city engineer; Milton H. Cook, city commis- sioner, and Daniel Wolf, chairman committee on streets in the board of councilmen, members, like himself, ex officio. Mr. Frank M. McCord, at present clerk to the superintendent in charge of the erection of the new Government buildings, was then clerk of the board. Mr. Smith declined a renomination, and his service in the council closed with that year. In 1875 he served as chairman of the Republican executive committee of the county, which restored it to Republicanism after the "tidal wave," and in the former year secured a large majority for R. B. Hayes, then running for governor, and the whole Republican ticket. He was again, the next year, in the same difficult position, and gave efficient as- sistance in the election of Governor Hayes to the Presi- dency. He labored with equal efficiency and success in behalf of the six million dollar loan proposed to the Southern railroad, in addition to the ten million dollars already expended-a triumph achieved in the face of much local opposition and other difficulties. Afterwards he was chairman of the committee having in charge the canvass in the city in behalf of the two million loan, which had once been lost, and carried it through victor- iously. During the last Presidential campaign, that of 1880, he was chairman of the campaign committee in the Lincoln club, which rendered most important ser- vices in the splendid Republican success of that year. Of this renowned institution he was one of the incorpor- ators, and has ever since been prominent and influential in its councils. In May, 1878, Mr. Smith, in considera- tion of his known abilities and eminent services to Presi- dent Hayes and the Republican party, was appointed to the post of collector of internal revenue of the first district of Ohio, was promptly confirmed by the Senate, and assumed charge of the office June 8th of the same year. His careful management of this office has been repeatedly testified by the Washington authorities, and at the close of his first year a formal certificate was sent by the Hon. Green B. Raum, commissioner of internal

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HISTORY OF CINCINNATI, OHIO.

revenue, saying that "this faithful discharge of a public trust merits commendation, and I take pleasure in tend- ering you the thanks of this office therefor." His office collects a larger sum of internal revenue than any other in the country, about twelve million dollars .per year passing through it.

Besides the public services mentioned above, Mr. Smith has assumed other important duties. He was one of the committee of the chamber of commerce (the other members being Richard Smith, of the Gazette, Mr. W. N. Hobart, president of the chamber, and S. H. Brinton), to negotiate the purchase of the post office building with the Secretary of the Treasury, for the uses of the chamber. He took a very active part in the organization of the first Sængerfest given by the Germans in the city, and was chairman of its committee on the press ; and also in the ceremonies attending the opening of the exposition buildings, for which he also served upon an important committee, and had an especial part to perform in the march of the Fourth division (civic) in the procession.

L. A. STALEY, EsQ.

This well-known citizen `of Cincinnati, treasurer of Hamilton county, traces his ancestry on the paternal side to Switzerland. The first of the family to reach the new world was Peter Staley, his great-great-grandfather, who came to this country early in its history. The more recent ancestors of Mr. Staley on this side are all Am- erican born. His grandfathers on both sides and two of his maternal uncles were soldiers of the War of 1812 -15. His maternal grandfather, Thomas Connor, came from Ireland when an orphan boy, and settled in Maryland, where he married and brought up his family. His youngest child and daughter, Rebecca Connor, was a native of Georgetown, District of Columbia, born in 1809, and was united in marriage at Frederick, Maryland, the seventeenth of December, 1835, to Henry Staley, great-grandson of the pioneer above named, and father of the subject of this notice, and a native of that county, born in 1810. The youthful pair lived in Frederick, where two of their children were born, until 1840. In that year Mr. Staley came on foot to the Miami country in company with several of his neighbors, on a prospect- ing tour for a place in which to settle his family to advantage. He fixed his affections upon Dayton, Mont- gomery county, Ohio, and in the absence of railroads and of an over full purse, he walked all the way back to Frederick, nearly six hundred miles, and soon started with his family for the great west. They settled in Day- ton, where the elder Staley engaged as a carpenter and builder and has since resided, in the successful prosecu- tion of his business. Himself and wife are both still living. He at the age of seventy-one is now building a handsome double house in Dayton, as an investment. He is yet vigorous and enterprising, and has accumula- ted a good sliare of this world's goods. The first child born to Henry and Rebecca (Connor) Staley in this place was Luke, who was ushere H into this world August

II, 1840. The public schools of Dayton offered his chief opportunities of education, and he pushed his way pretty well through them, but was ambitious to get into active life, and when only about seventeen years of age he took a position as salesman in the dry goods store of Thomas Shafer, in Dayton, where he remained for one and a half to two years, and then was compelled by the state of his health to seek more stirring and out-door employment. He began to learn the trade of a brick- mason, and worked for some time at the business, but did not take very kindly to it, and in the fall of 1861 he came to Cincinnati and accepted an agency for the Cin- cinnati Mutual Insurance company, an institution now merged with others in the Union Central Life Insurance company, of which Mr. Staley has been the general agent since 1871, and still retains his agency, devoting his business energies apart from the duties of his public office to the interests of this company.

During the whole time the Cincinnati Mutual was in existence, after Mr. Staley came to the city, he was its agent until the consolidation, and then took the general agency above mentioned. Our subject was early in pol- itics, both in sympathy and action. His father had been an old-line Jeffersonian Democrat until the rise of the Republican party shortly afterward. His opposition to the slave-power and institution of slavery twenty years before, had led to his removal from Maryland, in the face of a very eligible offer made by his employer there, and when Mr. Lincoln became a candidate for the Pres- idency, he received the warm support of the elder Staley. Under his advice and influence young Luke likewise cast his vote for the statesman of the prairies, and has since been steadfast in his allegiance to the principles and policy of the Republican party. He is one of the most active workers in politics in southwestern Ohio, and his voice is influential in the councils of the party. He was for a time chairman of the Republican executive committee of Hamilton county, and also a member of the Republican State central committee. He had never, however, sought office, but his services to the party, as well as his eminent qualifications, in the canvass of 1879 fixed the attention of the Republicans of the county upon him as a candidate for treasurer, and he was nomi- nated in July of that year, at the largest convention of the kind ever held in the city or State, numbering about one thousand delegates. He shared in the grand success of his ticket the ensuing fall, and was elected by the handsome majority of nearly two thousand five hundred. He assumed the duties of his office in September of the next year, and has since attended to them with thorough fidelity and efficiency. The importance of his post may be estimated from the fact that about six millions of the public money pass through his office yearly, and thie good people of Hamilton county are to be congratulated that their financial interests are reposed in hands so honest and capable.

Mr. Staley's parents are both members of the German Reformed church, and he has been a constant attendant upon its ministrations from early childhood, and is a cordial sympathizer with the practical teachings of Cliris-

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tianity. He was one of the founders and incorporators of the Lincoln club of Cincinnati, is specially active in its membership, and served as one of its directors in its earlier years. He was one of a committee selected to form its by-laws and give it a name, and upon his suggestion the society received its present very fitting and potent name of Lincoln club.

Mr. Staley has for his wife Lucretia Ellen (Kessler) Staley, daughter of Mr. Henry Kessler, a well-known resident of the Queen City, to whom he was united Jan- uary 9, 1866. They are blessed with four offspring- Charles Kessler (named from a maternal uncle), born Au- gust 27, 1866; Henry Kessler, (from his maternal grand- father, his paternal grandfather also being named Henry), born August 22, 1869; Laura Rebecca (from her paternal grandmother), whose natal day is January 19, 1872; and Ida Kessler (from a sister in-law of her mother), born June 8, 1874.

HON. W. S. CAPPELLER.

W. S. Cappeller, auditor of Hamilton county, was born in Somerset county, Pennsylvania, February 23, 1839, and removed when still a boy to Wayne county, Indiana. Having lost his father in 1852, he was apprenticed to the Hon. D. P. Holloway, then editor of the Richmond Palladium, to learn the trade of a printer; but his uncle, Philip Dom, of Mt. Healthy, Ohio, offered him the opportunity of obtaining a finished education at Farmer's college, of which he availed himself. His mother, who is still living, watched carefully over his instruction, and he attributes his success in life to the care and attention she bestowed on his early education. In 1859 he was married to Miss Lizzie Killen, of Mt. Healthy, and embarked in the dry goods and grocery business at that place. In 1866 he was appointed postmaster at Mt. Healthy, and held that office until 1872. In 1869 he was elected clerk of Springfield township, and also clerk of the township board of education, and was reelected three times. In 1870 he was appointed by the court of common pleas one of a committee of three to investigate the accounts of the officials of Hamilton county, and discharged his duty with such fidelity and thoroughness as to elicit the commendation of the people as well as the press ; and the general assembly of the State, acting upon the report made by the committee, amended the law relating to the compensation of county officials by a bill known as the "Hamilton Fee Bill," which is still in force. Mr. Cappeller served several years as tax omission deputy in the office of county auditor of this county, and in the fall of 1877 was himself elected auditor, after one of the most spirited campaigns in the political history of the county, being the only Republican elected on the ticket. He was reelected in October, 1880, by a majority of three thousand eight hundred and forty-five, receiving the largest vote and largest majority of any man on the ticket. His thorough familiarity with all the details and duties pertaining to the office has enabled him to meet without embarrassment its increasing labors and growing intricacies; and he distributes to the differ-

ent funds of Hamilton county five millions of dollars annually with as much ease and accuracy as his earlier predecessors distributed one-tenth of that amount.

For many years Mr. Cappeller has been prominently identified with the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, contributing to its publications, delivering addresses, etc., and as representative in the grand lodge of Ohio has al- ways been considered a wise and judicious counsellor. He was installed Worthy Grand Master of the Right Worthy Grand Lodge of Ohio, at Canton, on the sixteenth day of May, 1878, and filled the position with singular ability and intelligence. In December, 1880, he was elected to represent the State of Ohio in the Sovereign Grand Lodge of the world.

Mr. Cappeller is an original thinker and an effective public speaker, as is evidenced by the demands made upon his time and services during political and other campaigns. He is a gentleman of fine social as well as executive qualities, and by industry and a courteous de- meanor towards all has been successful in life and at- tained an enviable and justly deserved popularity.

SAMUEL F. HUNT.

The subject of this sketch was born at Springdale, Hamilton county, Ohio, on the twenty-second day of October, 1845. His parents were Dr. John Randolph Hunt and Amanda Baird Hunt, both from New Jersey. The following is copied from the tablet in the cemetery of Springdale :

"Doctor John Randolph Hunt, born at Cherry Hill, near Princeton, New Jersey, July 3, 1793. Died August 1, 1863. A student of the university of New Jersey, and a graduate of the College of Medicine and Surgery of New York, and for more than forty years a practicing physician in the Miami valley. In his death his family lost an indul- gent husband and father, the profession a faithful practitioner, and the community an estimable friend and fellow citizen."

Samuel F. Hunt, son of Dr. Hunt, was early led in the paths of learning by his parents, both of whom were persons of culture and refinement, and under compe- tent private instruction laid the foundation for after eminence in scholarly pursuits. His family connections were such as to give advantages which he failed not to improve, and even in boyhood he became known for the variety and extent of his information, excellency of speech and polished address. In 1860 Samuel F. en- tered Miami university, at Oxford, where he remained for nearly four years, going thence to Union college, New York, where he completed his course and graduat- ed under the venerable Dr. Nott. Four years later the college conferred upon him the degree A. M., and about the same time Miami university awarded him a diploma as to a regular graduate of the class of 1864, and also the honorary degree of master of arts. After this, Mr. Hunt read law in the office of the Hon. Stanley Mat- thews, and graduated from the Cincinnati Law school in 1867.

In May of that year he started upon a European tour, visiting the continent and thence beyond Greece, Pales- tine, Egypt and Arabia. During his travels abroad, his

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letters were published in the Cincinnati Enquirer and largely copied into the other papers. Upon his return Mr. Hunt was frequently solicited and made addresses upon his travels, which were put in permanent form at the request of numerous auditors.

In 1867 he was nominated for the house of repre- sentatives, and in 1869 was in the senate, where, by a vote decidedly complimentary, he was made president pro tem. and acting lieutenant-governor. He was a member of the judiciary committee and committee on common schools, and was the author of the university bill, the park bill, and other measures affecting the inter- ests of Cincinnati. When at home he was an industri- ous memher of the board of education. Previous to these years, even in boyhood, his powers of oratory were known and acknowledged, and at the outbreak of the Rebellion his speeches were those of an uncompromis- ing patriot, and were enthusiastically applauded. In his own neighborhood his services are remembered in the work of recruiting the Eighty-third and other Ohio regi- ments. In 1862 he went to Shiloh to care for the sick and wounded; and afterwards, in 1865, went with Gen- eral Weitzel's advance into Richmond, where he re- mained several weeks, having charge of the supplies which were furnished to sufferers in the city.

While in college Mr. Hunt was honored frequently by being called upon to make the annual and other ad- dresses before the literary societies and upon great occasions, and since his graduation he has been con- stantly in receipt of invitations to make addresses, both at home and abroad. Among the addresses which gave Mr. Hunt prominence in scholarly and oratorical way, mention may be made of those before the Miami lit- erary societies during the year 1864, also before the literary societies at Marietta college, Kenyon college, Georgetown college (Kentucky), Williams college (Mas- sachusetts), the annual address before the largest assem- bly of recent years in the university of Virginia, his address with Governors Hayes and Allen at the unveil- ing of the. soldiers' monument, Findlay, Ohio, and that at the Grant banquet in 1880.

In 1874, Mr. Hunt was appointed by Governor Noyes a trustee of Miami university, and at the same time was made a director of Cincinnati university, at Cincinnati. From that time up to the present he has been either director or president in these university boards, by re- appointment and re-election. Besides serving as secre- tary of the agricultural society of the county, and mak- ing speeches at the harvest home festivals in different townships, Mr. Hunt has found some time to recreate in politics; and since his entry therein, in 1867, he has been known as the "Pride of the Democracy" of Ham- ilton county. Although defeated in the race for repre- sentative in the year last-named, he was elected to the State senate; his abilities were at once recognized, and he was made president pro tem. of that body, being. the youngest man that ever occupied that position. He was a participant in the Democratic State convention of 1869, and served two years on the State Central com- mittee. In 1873 he was president of the convention

that nominated Governor Allen, and in 1874 made a speech on the veto power, in the Ohio Constitutional convention. This was one of Mr. Hunt's best efforts, and he refers to it, and justly, with some pride as a good speech. In 1869 Mr. Hunt was, while president of the senate, acting lieutenant-governor; and ten years later was judge-advocate-general, with the rank of brigadier general.

From the commencement of his profession with the Hon. Henry Stanberry to the present time, Mr. Hunt has been an industrious worker in the law, and now enjoys a lucrative and constantly increasing practice. Still in the prime of life, of good appearance and pleasant address, Mr. Hunt is one of the foremost at the Cincinnati bar ; and being rarely gifted with social qualities, his home is the frequent resort of personal friends of both political parties. Mrs. Hunt, the mother of Samuel F., is an estimable lady, whose graces and hospitalities will be remembered kindly by every visitor at the old home mansion. With her son she still resides in the comfortable "home of fifty years ago," across the street from the academy where Governor Oliver P. Morton received part of his early education. Here, also, under the shade-trees of Mrs. Hunt's home may be seen the first classical academy in this neighborhood, and near by the little church, from which, as Mrs. Hunt re- lates, the first missionary was sent from the west to the far east. On the brow of a hill on the outskirts of the village, may be seen the spot where Elliott was killed by the Indians in 1794. The ancestors of Hon. Samuel F. Hunt, whose sketch is thus hurriedly written, were re- lated to the active patriots of the Revolution, the grand- sires on part of both father and mother having fought in the battles at Princeton and Monmouth Court House; and when the pioneer days of Hamilton county are re- called, and reminiscences verge on the history of noble fathers on Revolutionary fields, the conversa tional powers of Mrs. Hunt are displayed in the best light, and in the charm of personal narration one may easily perceive that the honorable eminence of the son is largely due to the rare mental qualities and superior culture of the mother.

SAMUEL W. RAMP, EsQ.

One of the notable features of politics and the public service in Cincinnati and Hamilton county, is the num- ber of comparatively young men occupying the most re- sponsible, and in some cases the most difficult, positions, by the willing suffrages of the people. Several of these -as Auditor Capeller, of the county official force, and Comptroller Eshelby, of the city government-appear with suitable notices in our galaxy of prominent Queen citizens ; and we are happy to be able to add to the rep- resentatives of the brain, business tact and ability, and personal popularity of young Cincinnati, the name which heads this article-by no means the least in prominence and responsible duty of those which appear in this vol- ume. Mr. Ramp is as yet but thirty-six years old, having been born in this city January 18, 1845. His father, also named Samuel, was a native of Norfolk county, England,

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born in 1808. His mother, whose maiden name was Elizabeth Smith, was born in the same county, but two years later than he who became her husband. They were married February 6, 1828, in the old country, but early determined to push their fortunes in the New World, to which they emigrated in 1834. They remained in the east a few years, then came to Cincinnati in 1840, where they have since continuously resided, the father still pursuing actively the trade of a bricklayer and builder, which he took up upon arriving here nearly half a century ago. Three of their children were born in the old country and three here, but all are now in the grave except the subject of this sketch. He is the youngest of the family. His education was received in the public schools of Cincinnati, and was continued to the A grade of the first intermediate department, when the needs of the family, or his ambition to make an independent living, led him, at the age of thirteen, to abandon the schools and take an appointment as messenger in the court-rooms then occupied by their honors, Judges P. Mallon and C. Murdock. It is a fact of some interest that his business career began, nearly a quarter of a century since, in the same building where he is now doing the best and strongest work of his life. After about two years' service in the courts, he took a clerkship, though still very young, in the office of Colonel Oliver H. Geoffroy, then incum- bent of the office of county treasurer. He remained with the Colonel during his entire administration and then made a venture in the banking business, at first as assistant teller in the First National bank of Cincinnati, upon its organization about 1863. His experience in the county treasury peculiarly fitted him for his duties here, and he was presently advanced to the post of re- ceiving teller, one of the best and most important places in a banking institution. After some two years' service in this bank, he accompanied its cashier in the formation of a new bank, the Central National, in which also he took the position of receiving teller. He remained in this but one year, and then, in 1866, being as yet but twenty-one years old, he passed to the Third National bank, in which he obtained the yet higher office of as- sistant cashier. His duties here, as elsewhere, were so performed as to secure the approbation of his superiors, and to lead to a much longer connection than with either of the other banks he served. He was assistant cashier of the Third National for fourteen years, or until he assumed the duties of his office in February, 1880. He obtained this nomination at the great, unwieldly Repub- lican convention of that year, which comprised nearly one thousand members, and after five ballots and a struggle of several hours against other candidates, most of them his superiors in age and duration of political service, the choice of the convention fell upon Mr. Ramp; and the nomination was triumphantly ratified at the polls in October by a majority of about three thousand seven hundred. He had well entitled himself to the position, not only by his fidelity, efficiency, and integrity in busi- ness, but by his services to the dominant party. He had taken an active interest in politics from the time he be- came a citizen, was an original member and is now a di-

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History of Cincinnati, Ohio, with illustrations and biographical sketches, Part 121

Author: Ford, Henry A., comp; Ford, Kate B., joint comp Publication date: 1881 Publisher: Cleveland, O., L.A. Williams & co. Number of Pages: 666

Author: Ford, Henry A., comp; Ford, Kate B., joint comp
Publication date: 1881
Publisher: Cleveland, O., L.A. Williams & co.
Number of Pages: 666